<BLOCKQUOTE id=quote><font size=2 face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id=quote>quote:<hr height=1 noshade id=quote>
<BLOCKQUOTE id=quote><font size=2 face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id=quote>quote:<hr height=1 noshade id=quote>[123...]: when you argue that - since things can't pass out of existence, they can't come into existence- that seems to contradict experience: The empirical fact is that things ARE in existence- thus proving things CAN come into existence.<hr height=1 noshade id=quote></BLOCKQUOTE id=quote></font id=quote><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" size=2 id=quote>
That is faulty logical. It only proves that either things can come into existence, <i>or</i> that they have always existed. Right?
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Thx for the reply Dr. Flandern. If I may, let's review this critical point:
Things are in existence, that is a fact, I hope we can agree on that. Since things are in existence, it must imply that coming into existence was a possibility because... it happened! I say WAS because the laws of nature must have been different prior to our present existence, making creation possibly irreversible. It is not a logical fallacy to assume things can come into existence but not out of existence since existence has a different set of rules than non-existence. Going back to the government analogy, it would be like saying that an anarchy can not produce a democracy. And along the same lines, the set of rules are much different for a democratic state than an anarchic state. In fact, an anarchic state can encompass all sets of rules.
In contrast, if we were to argue that existence actually proves something can't come from nothing, it leads to circular reasoning.
Since we exist, something must have come from nothing- empirical fact directly contradicts our premise. Taking the position instead that the universe has always existed doesn't help much. All the conservation principles would contradict itself. Let's take a bowling ball moving in space for example. Conservation tells us that something must have transferred energy to the ball for it to be moving- the motion must have a cause (or beginning). If we declare in this example that the energy was always there, then this is already an example that an effect has no cause. Thus, there is no conservation. But there is. But there isn't. But there is. Ad infinitium.
Imagine Adam and Eve borning a child named Ernie, then died. The child is the only human left on Earth. Having no memories of birth nor knowledge of his parents, Ernie ends up believing she has always existed and had no cause. Is she correct in doing so? If her parents bodies are never found, no one can prove her wrong. But if she became attentive to other life forms around her and observed the evidence of cause and effect, would she still be justified in her original position?
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